Note: This was originally posted on a earlier blog I owned. Thanks to the Supreme Court’s decision in Obergefell v. Hodges, marriage equality is now the law. I’m reposting for posterity.
(Photo credit: Wikipedia)
People ask me why I fight so hard for marriage equality. It doesn’t personally affect me in any obvious way – I’m a straight white male, married to a straight white woman, with four boys that are too young to have any idea of what their sexual preferences are, but are statistically likely to be straight.
The most obvious answer for why I fight is because it’s the right thing to do. All men and women are created equal and deserve the same rights and protections. To treat any person’s life and love as lesser than another person’s is just wrong to me on a fundamental level.
But I have another reason, one closer to home. My son Jude’s mother was raised, as she likes to say, by nomadic circus performing lesbians. When her father cheated on her mother, she left him and eventually entered into a relationship with her close friend.
Jude’s grandparents, Diane and Gainer, have been together since Mandi (Jude’s mother) was a very young girl. Next to my grandparent’s, they have the most stable, long-lasting, and loving relationship of anyone I know. Together, they provided a home for Mandi and a nucleus for an amazing extended family. The world is better off for having Diane and Gainer in it. And because of them, I never worry about my son or his mother, even though they live in the craziest state of all.
But, despite their example of what a stable long-term relationship should be, Diane and Gainer cannot be married. If Diane were to be critically injured tomorrow, there’s no guarantee that Gainer could even get to see her before she was either released or died. They each have to carry their own insurance because only spouses can be added to their employers’ insurance plans.
Kim Kardashian could marry Kris Humphries and then file for divorce after seventy-two days, but Diane and Gainer getting married after over twenty years together would violate the sanctity of marriage? Bullshit.
I will not have my son grow up being told that his grandparents’ relationship isn’t as good as mine just because they’re both women. Mandi is bi. If she decides to be with a woman for the rest of her life, I will not have him be told that their relationship is lesser. If he decides he will be with another man, I will not have him be told that he’s not as good as everyone else and doesn’t have the right to marry that man.
This is why I fight.
This post was directly inspired by Whitney Drake’s post “Why I Fight” about the reason she fights for marriage equality. Please be sure to check out her post, and every other post she’s written.
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